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The Party of "No"

Technorati and Me

Technorati is indexing me again! They had to make a code change to fix
the problem with my blog getting stuck in their queue. Kudos to Eric M.
and the guys at
GetSatisfaction.com
where they have "community powered support for Technorati".

Well, they're "sorta, kinda" indexing me anyway. It's on a 24 hour tape
delay or something. So I never get picked up by Memeorandum because they
pull from Technorati and Technorati has stuff I posted yesterday
listed as my latest blog entry. And that's old news to Memeorandum.

Wankers.

Fair Use Notice

"This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been
specifically authorized by the copyright owner. It is being made available in
an effort to advance the understanding of environmental, political, human
rights, economic, democracy, scientific, social issues, etc. It is believed
that this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided
for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C.
Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit for
research and educational purposes."

A problem with this country is that some things that benefit everyone
are purchased individually, and some things
paid for collectively are given free to
those few individuals who get all their benefit.

Yes, the biggest reason Netflix hiked rates is simply because they can.
Everybody knows that
Netflix service is still a good deal even at nearly twice the price.
People grumble, but in the end
they'll reach down
into their pockets and pay an extra ten spot for the convenience of
advertisement free, on-demand films and current TV shows. Have you seen
the prices at a regular theater? I feel robbed watching "The Twenty" after shelling out twelve bucks
for a ticket. And think of whot commercial
infested "triple play" cable or DSL costs. How can
anybody criticize Netflix for charging what the market will bear? Kudos to Netflix.

But there's another reason for the hike. Netflix has been opening its wallet up to Hollywood and
needs to recover that royalty
expense. Back in December, there were
reports of Netflix
offering top dollar for TV shows. More recently there was a deal with NBC Universal. And I expect that tons of other deals are in the making. We all
want to watch the best and latest movies, Netflix wants to save postage by setting up streaming deals with studios, and the studios want their rent paid.
So what does this have to do with free stuff and the fall of
the American Empire? Simple.

Copyrights.

The constitution gives the government the power "to promote
the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors
and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." I understand
society's need for the "embarrasment" of a patent or copyright, but there need to be limits to
what private intellectual monopolies we create. The framers felt this way too. Note the phrase
limited terms, and nowhere does it say the "securing" of the right has to be
totally free of charge to the authors and inventors. Therefore, I say the government should start charging authors for
copyrights. Yes, charge. Pay up for your free stuff you millionaire movie moguls and pulp fiction fat cats you.

The way the law is now, copyrights are basically free of charge, and
last more than a lifetime. In my view, that's free stuff
for billionaires, pure and simple. Disney company sits there in taxpayer protected veritable perpetuity
rent seeking with a portfolio of films created by authors and artists now in the grave. To add insult to injury, many of
those films are based on captured public domain characters or
plagiarized stories and characters. In my opinion, so long as there's an taxpayer funded FBI warning on the Lion King, Disney
owes the US taxpayer a cut of its action.

Here's how I'd do it. The first year, copyright would be free. By the end of that year, to continue receiving taxpayer
financed protection of some "work" you'd need to register the work on the USPTO web site and pay $1. Yes, just a buck the
first year. The second year, the price would be $2 to renew. Then $4, $8, $16, and so on. After 10 years the renewal will
be $1024. If you can't make a grand from your book or movie in ten years, maybe you need to give up on
it and write something better, OK? After
20 years the price would be just over a million bucks, still chump change for any big media catalog item, like Harry Potter.
If after 20-30 years you're making enough money on your work, you'll pay.
If you miss a payment: bzzzzzt! The work goes into the public domain. As
original author you can still sell or use it after failing to renew, but so can anyone else.

I hate to say it, but US manufacturing is fading. Is there any doubt that intellectual property is the way of the future for this country?
We need to support new IP creators and we need to support the development of innovative information distributors
like Netflix and Amazon. Locking down the rent seeking business model of big media is not the way to promote
the progress of science and the useful arts. Media innovators need an open playing field, with a rich public domain providing a
steady flow of new content unencumbered by an entrenched media monopoly.

Unsurprisingly, Obama and his Hollywood backers have offered nothing
with regard to this sort of IP reform, but the GOP hasn't been any better. Of late,
none of our elected representatives seem to be looking out for the public
interest on this issue. PDEA seems dead.
My copyright-for-a-fee plan might generate a few cents to help balance the budget, but more importantly
it would shake loose millions of so called "orphaned" works, abandoned by their original authors yet
unusable by Netflix or Amazon because of the uncertainty in their ownership. It would also gradually
strip exclusivity away from original authors after "limited terms" in natural
proportion to how important and/or profitable the work is to that author. Over time, even the most valuable
works would turn over to the public domain, as I believe was the Founding Father's original intent.
Best of all, the predictable supply of freed IP would allow third parties to find innovative ways to deliver high quality content without being burdened by perpetual
payments to rent seekers.

Want a way to tax the rich and promote innovation at the same time? Charge for copyrights.